


you were beyond comprehension tonight

by plantyourtreeswithme



Category: Lost
Genre: Angst and Tragedy, Canonical Character Death, Changing Tenses, Desmond's Flashes, Explicit Language, M/M, Mutual Pining, Non-Linear Narrative, Slight Canon Divergence, Sort Of, Spoilers, Time Skips
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-20
Updated: 2020-08-20
Packaged: 2021-03-06 20:34:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,040
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26005012
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/plantyourtreeswithme/pseuds/plantyourtreeswithme
Summary: He tells himself he's doing it for Claire. He can't afford to acknowledge why he really keeps saving Charlie's life.
Relationships: Desmond Hume/Charlie Pace
Comments: 2
Kudos: 11





	you were beyond comprehension tonight

**Author's Note:**

> A rough depiction of Desmond's struggle to comprehend time, in all its nonlinear, squiggly splendor.
> 
> Title from M. Ward's lovely ["Hold Time."](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Brsw4znRq34)

Charlie stands upon the sand and looks at him, and that's all Desmond has ever really wanted. Glances that last seconds, covert looks with funny endings - that's all he needs.

Their knuckles brush when Charlie passes him the handgun for their hunting trip. Desmond tries to pull away quickly, afraid, but Charlie... he just looks at Desmond. Reaches out and places his fingers on top of his for a long moment, and then pulls away again.

"Why are you doing this?" Charlie asked after the birds, and Desmond felt him. He feels his hands on him, on the helicopter - pulling him away from something terrible in the belly of an iron ship, and he thinks, _Because I need you to live. For me._

"Why do you keep interfering?" he says to Desmond. He remembers he hasn't told Charlie yet - too many not-yet-memories rattling 'round in his head.

"Desmond," Charlie said. Charlie said and says and will say; tilts Desmond's chin up and has no idea what that simple press of fingers against stubble-flecked skin does to him.

"Claire needs you," Desmond tells him. The lie falls easy from his lips: stained with guilt and Charlie's blood and Claire's wild cries.

("Terrible liar, this one," Charlie says later, on the sand under his tent roof. Desmond will grin and kiss the words out of his mouth.)

But now, Desmond can't bear to explain that there are futures where Charlie is happy and alive and all in one piece, and he is with Desmond. They will hold each other on the runway; Charlie will introduce him to his brother Liam, and - and Desmond can put a face to him before they've even met, all wide-eyed and spiky hair and father's smile. Sober like Charlie.

He gets the flashes, and they're awful because they give him this gut-wrenching shred of hope. He can feel Charlie's hand in his as they stand on Penny's deck, the waves lapping beyond. He can see Penny's ashen face when she tries to hug him and is gently nudged away.

"Claire needs you; Aaron needs you," Desmond explains lamely.

"Bollocks," Charlie said, so charmingly British. And pressed forward to kiss him.

"We can't," Desmond will say when they finally part. "We... Claire, and the baby, and -"

"Not an issue," Charlie tells him. He is somewhat muffled and bleary-eyed against Desmond's neck.

"You can't do this to me, Charlie. You can't... can't give me what I won't ever have," he said. He knows Charlie would not, could not understand. He picks up - will pick up, has - the ring from the crib and turns it over in his hands. Claire was not meant to have it; Aaron never remembers.

He chucked it into the sea, a silver fleck that sinks and pools and maybe floats out to Charlie.

But now - now Desmond has something of a hold on the present. Charlie kisses and will kiss him, so he says, "You're going to die." Watches Charlie blink, shrug his shoulders noncommittally.

"Always figured it was gonna happen here," he explains. "Eventually."

Desmond nods. Charlie's whole body is shaking. "I'm going to keep trying," he tells him. "I'm not gonna stop just 'cause Time's telling me not to."

(Charlie cried later, in one of their tents, and wiped his eyes messily with his shirt sleeve so Desmond wouldn't see. But Desmond holds him anyway, tells him of everything that could've been. Can be.

If he can just keep saving him.)

* * *

"You alright, Des?" Charlie says. Worry quavers in his voice; they are sitting on the jungle floor. A glimpse overwhelms Desmond like a wave of heat, and his head pounds. Charlie's hand rubs circles into his shoulder.

"I named my son for you," he grits out, dry heaves. Charlie shushes him in the gentlest of ways and doesn't ask him what that means. Desmond thinks about how fate has never been in his hands - how he's been told his whole life what to do. How Time is tormenting him, even after the button: telling him now that he should've saved Charlie - he had so many chances - he still can.

There's something still waiting for them, in a little cottage nestled between two hills. On a different kind of island. There's a guitar by the fireplace and a child with blonde pigtails, and a frumpy-looking dog that greets Desmond every evening when he comes home. There's a delicious smell wafting in from the kitchen - and Charlie in a frilly apron, short, cropped hair - a thousand photographs and picture albums and over there, a dusty piano -

"We could've married," Desmond tells him, voice cracking. A harsh sob loses itself in the ground. He coughs. "In ten years. We got married, we were happy - we -"

_"Don't,"_ Charlie says fiercely. Desmond doesn't have to open his eyes to know that he's crying, too. He will grab Desmond firmly at his shoulders and kiss him almost feverishly.

"Don't tell me," he said when they came up for air. "I want to be surprised when it happens."

* * *

"None of it makes sense," Charlie said in the morning, pulling on his clothes and looking at Desmond with an awful expression.

"How do you think I feel?" Desmond asks softly. He knows full well Charlie will never know - never understand what it feels like to lose your grip on reality. He never got the chance to explain.

They return from the hunting trip. Charlie volunteers to go down to the Looking Glass. Desmond holds him close each night; silently begs him not to leave.

Widmore puts him in the wooden room, and he prays for whoever's listening to let him see Charlie again. He will sit at the bottom of a well, bloodied, and speak Charlie's name. Hoping against hope.

There's still sand in Charlie's hair, he realizes, as they rock back and forth in the outrigger. From the night before. They say things to each other that Desmond can't hear yet, hasn't seen or felt.

Charlie doesn't try to knock him out. He holds Desmond's hands and gives him a letter that later will be waterlogged, drowned inside his pocket.

"I think I loved you," Charlie said. Charlie's eyes ache, breaking over the ocean floor.

Desmond lets him go.

**Author's Note:**

> If you enjoyed this, I would so appreciate you taking the time to comment and tell me what you thought. I read, cherish, and respond to every one <3


End file.
